Blue Origin, founded by billionaire Jeff Bezos, had to postpone the highly anticipated launch of its New Glenn rocket on Sunday due to unfavorable weather factors at Cape Canaveral.
Launch Delay Reasons
Precipitation and a technical problem on the ground caused early setbacks, then came thick clouds as the narrow time frame for launch closed, leaving mission controllers to push back the vehicle's upcoming flight.
Rivalry between Blue Origin and Musk's space company has been heating up in the past few months.
New Launch Window
To ease traffic in the skies amid the government funding gap, the Federal Aviation Administration is restricting commercial rocket liftoffs starting the beginning of the week.
Following the cancellation of the launch, Blue Origin said late Sunday that, in coordination with the FAA, it was targeting a new try as early as Wednesday within a time slot of afternoon hours Eastern Standard time.
Mission Objectives
Upon successful liftoff, the 98-meter tall launch vehicle will carry the US space agency's Escapade twin spacecraft to Mars, to examine the planet’s climate history with the eventual hope of sending people there.
The mission will also serve as a crucial trial of its ability to perform booster recovery, which would represent a technical breakthrough for the company if successful.
Previous Flight
New Glenn’s inaugural flight in January was marked as a achievement, as its cargo reached space and successfully performed tests.
But its first-stage booster, which was meant to be recoverable, did not stick its landing on a platform in the Atlantic, and ended up destroyed during descent.
Landing Attempts
In its second effort the launch provider will make another attempt to land the first stage.
Until now, only SpaceX has achieved that feat.
Industry Competition
Rival firms of tycoons Musk and Bezos are engaged in a commercial space race that has grown more intense lately, as NASA opened up proposals for its lunar exploration program, noting that SpaceX was falling behind schedule.
Donald Trump’s second term has seen the administration pile pressure on the agency to speed up its progress to launch astronauts to the lunar surface in competition against the Asian nation.
Increased competition between the two firms could “give us more choices with regard to liftoff.”
“More launches means more ideas in orbit,” an ex-agency official stated. “It can’t be a negative to have Blue Origin, even trailing behind.”
